Articles/Books

Monday, September 23, 2013

Sir William Blackstone on Offenses against God and Religion (Theonomy Applied)

"[B]esides the notorious indecency and scandal of permitting any
secular business to be publicly transacted on that day in a country
professing Christianity, and the corruption of morals which
usually follows its profanation, the keeping one day in the seven
holy, as a time of relaxation and refreshment as well as for public
worship, is of admirable service to a state." --
Sir William Blackstone on the Lord's Day

Sir William Blackstone (1723-1780) was an English jurist, judge, legal scholar, and Tory politician. An influential writer, he is famous for his Commentaries on the Laws of England.

Blackstone's Commentaries includes a section titled "Of Offences against God and Religion." This includes a very interesting historical overview and commentary on English laws influenced by Christianity and the law of God.

While not all historical application conforms to Scripture (and we certainly do not endorse some of the practices of the Anglican church, some of which were imposed), and we do not agree with those statements by Blackstone that are soft on applying biblical civil law (although he is right to oppose abuses of it, which there were), Blackstone's discussion is helpful in terms of understanding both historic theonomic application and misapplication. For example, there was a time when witchcraft was rightfully a capital offense; but unfortunately, not all of those condemned to death were necessarily guilty of this crime.

Blackstone's discussion is also helpful in getting ideas for modern application of theonomy; for instance, it was illegal "to publish a correct account of the proceedings in a court of justice if it contain matter of a scandalous, blasphemous, or indecent nature." There very well could be some wisdom here—at least in dealing with a blasphemy trial—in order to keep blasphemous statements against God from circulating.

Finally, Blackstone's commentary itself is at times very insightful. For instance, he points out that historically, all countries have testified to the existence of witchcraft (such as through prohibitions of it), and also notes the corruption in morals that results in profanation of the Lord's Day.

"Of Offences against God and Religion" (excerpts)

Commentaries on the Laws of England

Sir William Blackstone

On punishing apostasy:

Theodosius (above) and
Valentinian decreed
capital punishment for
apostates who
"endeavoured to pervert
others to the same
iniquity."

First, then, of such crimes and misdemeanours as more
immediately offend Almighty God, by openly transgressing the precepts of
religion, either natural or revealed; and mediately by their bad example and
consequence the law of society also; which constitutes that guilt in the action
which human tribunals are to censure.1. Of this species the first is that
of apostasy, or a total renunciation of Christianity, by embracing
either a false religion or no religion at all. This offence can only take place
in such as have once professed the true religion. The perversion of a Christian
to Judaism, paganism, or other false religion, was punished by the emperors
Constantine and Julian with confiscation of goods; to which the emperors
Theodosius and Valentinian added capital punishment, in case the apostate
endeavoured to pervert others to the same iniquity; a punishment too
severe for any temporal laws to inflict upon any spiritual offence; and yet the
zeal of our ancestors imported it into this country; for we find by Bracton that
in his time apostates were to be burnt to death. Doubtless the preservation of
Christianity, as a national religion, is, abstracted from its own intrinsic
truth, of the utmost consequence to the civil state: which a single instance
will sufficiently demonstrate. The belief of a future state of rewards and
punishments, the entertaining just ideas of the moral attributes of the Supreme
Being, and a firm persuasion that he superintends and will finally compensate
every action in human life, (all which are clearly revealed in the doctrines,
and forcibly inculcated by the precepts, of our Saviour Christ,) these are the
grand foundation of all judicial oaths; which call God to witness the truth of
those facts, which perhaps may be only known to him and the party attesting;
all moral evidence, therefore, all confidence in human veracity, must be
weakened by apostasy and overthrown by total infidelity. Wherefore all affronts
to Christianity, or endeavours to depreciate its efficacy, in those who have
once professed it, are highly deserving of censure. But yet the loss of life is
a heavier penalty than the offence, taken in a civil light, deserves; and taken
in a spiritual light, our laws have no jurisdiction over it. This punishment
therefore has long ago become obsolete; and the offence of apostasy was for a
long time the object only of the ecclesiastical courts, which corrected the
offender pro salute animæ. But about the close of the last century
the civil liberties to which we were then restored being used as a cloak of
maliciousness, and the most horrid doctrines, subversive of all religion, being
publicly avowed both in discourse and writings, it was thought necessary again
for the civil power to interpose by not admitting those miscreants to the
privileges of society who maintained such principles as destroyed all moral
obligation.To this end it was enacted, by statute 9 & 10 W. III. c. 32,
that if any person educated in, or having made profession of, the Christian
religion, shall, by writing, printing, teaching, or advised speaking, deny the
Christian religion to be true, or the holy scriptures to be of divine
authority, he shall upon the first offence be rendered incapable to hold any
office or place of trust; and for the second be rendered incapable of bringing
any action, being guardian, executor, legatee, or purchaser of lands, and shall
suffer three years’ imprisonment without bail. To give room, however, for
repentance, if, within four months after the first conviction, the delinquent
will in open court publicly renounce his error, he is discharged for that once
from all disabilities.

On punishing heresy:II. A second offence is that of heresy, which
consists not in a total denial of Christianity, but of some of its essential doctrines
publicly and obstinately avowed; being defined by Sir Matthew Hale, “sententia
rerum divinarum humano sensu excogitata, palam docta et pertinaciter defensa.” And
here it must also be acknowledged that particular modes of belief or unbelief,
not tending to overturn Christianity itself, or to sap the foundations of
morality, are by no means the object of coercion by the civil magistrate. What
doctrines shall therefore be adjudged heresy was left by our old constitution
to the determination of the ecclesiastical judge; who had herein a most
arbitrary latitude allowed him. For the general definition of a heretic given
by Lyndewode, extends to the smallest deviation from the doctrines of holy
church; “hæreticus est qui dubitat de fide catholica, et qui negligit servare
ea, quæ Romana ecclesia statuit, seu servare decreverat.” Or, as the statute 2
Hen. IV. c. 15 expresses it in English, “teachers of erroneous opinions,
contrary to the faith and blessed determinations of the holy church.” Very
contrary this to the usage of the first general councils, which defined all
heretical doctrines with the utmost precision and exactness. And what ought to
have alleviated the punishment, the uncertainty of the crime, seems to have
enhanced it in those days of blind zeal and pious cruelty.

Henry VIII declared "that offences
against the see of Rome are not
heresy."

It is true that the
sanctimonious hypocrisy of the canonists went at first no further than
enjoining penance, excommunication, and ecclesiastical deprivation for heresy;
though afterwards they proceeded boldly to imprisonment by the ordinary, and
confiscation of goods in pios uses. But in the mean time they had
prevailed upon the weakness of bigoted princes to make the civil power
subservient to their purposes, by making heresy not only a temporal but even a
capital offence: the Romish ecclesiastics determining, without appeal, whatever
they pleased to be heresy, and shifting off to the secular arm the odium and drudgery
of executions; with which they themselves were too tender and delicate to
intermeddle. Nay, they pretended to intercede and pray on behalf of the
convicted heretic, ut citra mortis periculum sententia circa eum moderatur; well
knowing at the same time that they were delivering the unhappy victim to
certain death. Hence the capital punishments inflicted on the antient Donatists
and Manichæans by the emperors Theodosius and Justinian: hence also the
constitution of the emperor Frederic, mentioned by Lyndewode, adjudging
all persons, without distinction, to be burned with fire who were convicted of
heresy by the ecclesiastical judge. The same emperor, in another constitution, ordained
that if any temporal lord, when admonished by the church, should neglect to
clear his territories of heretics within a year, it should be lawful for good
catholics to seize and occupy the lands and utterly to exterminate the
heretical possessors. And upon this foundation was built that arbitrary power,
so long claimed and so fatally exerted by the pope, of disposing even of the
kingdoms of refractory princes to more dutiful sons of the church. The
immediate event of this constitution was something singular, and may serve to
illustrate at once the gratitude of the holy see and the just punishment of the
royal bigot: for upon the authority of this very constitution the pope
afterwards expelled this very emperor Frederic from his kingdom
of Sicily and gave it to Charles of
Anjou.

On Henry the VIII and the supremacy of the bishops of Rome:Afterwards, when the final reformation of religion began to
advance, the power of the ecclesiastics was somewhat moderated; for though what
heresy is was not then precisely defined, yet we were told in some
points what it is not: the statute 25 Hen. VIII. c. 14 declaring that
offences against the see of Rome are not heresy, and the ordinary being thereby
restrained from proceeding in any case upon mere suspicion; that is, unless the
party be accused by two credible witnesses, or an indictment of heresy be first
previously found in the king’s courts of common law. And yet the spirit of
persecution was not then abated, but only diverted into a lay channel. For in
six years afterwards, by statute 31 Hen. VIII. c. 14, the bloody law of the six
articles was made, which established the six most contested points of popery,
transubstantiation, communion in one kind, the celibacy of the clergy, monastic
vows, the sacrifice of the mass, and auricular confession; which points were
“determined and resolved by the most godly study, pain, and travail of his
majesty: for which his most humble and obedient subjects, the lords spiritual and
temporal, and the commons in parliament assembled, did not only render and give
unto his highness their most high and hearty thanks,” but did also enact and
declare all oppugners of the first to be heretics, and to be burned with fire;
and of the five last to be felons, and to suffer death. The same statute
established a new and mixed jurisdiction of clergy and laity for the trial and
conviction of heretics; the reigning prince being then equally intent on
destroying the supremacy of the bishops of Rome
and establishing all other their corruptions of the Christian religion.

On push during Blackstone's time to return to punishing polytheism and anti-Trinitarianism:The legislature hath indeed thought it proper that the civil
magistrate should again interpose with regard to one species of heresy very
prevalent in modern times; for, by statute 9 & 10 W. III. c. 32, if any
person educated in the Christian religion, or professing the same, shall, by
writing, printing, teaching, or advised speaking, deny any one of the persons
of the Holy Trinity to be God, or maintain that there are more Gods than one,
he shall undergo the same penalties and incapacities which were just now
mentioned to be inflicted on apostasy by the same statute.

On punishing the reviling of the ordinances of the established church:III. Another species of offences against religion are those
which affect the established church. And these are either positive or
negative: positive, by reviling its ordinances; or negative, by non-conformity
to its worship. Of both of these in their order.1. And, first, of the offence of reviling
the ordinances of the church. This is a crime of a much grosser nature
than the other of mere non-conformity, since it carries with it the utmost
indecency, arrogance, and ingratitude: indecency, by setting up private
judgment in virulent and factious opposition to public authority; arrogance, by
treating with contempt and rudeness what has at least a better chance to be
right than the singular notions of any particular man; and ingratitude, by
denying that indulgence and undisturbed liberty of conscience to the members of
the national church which the retainers to every petty conventicle enjoy. However, it is provided, by statutes 1 Edw. VI. c. 1, and 1 Eliz. c. 1, that
whoever reviles the sacrament of the Lord’s supper shall be punished by fine
and imprisonment; and, by the statute 1 Eliz. c. 2, if any minister shall speak
any thing in derogation from the book of common prayer, he shall, if not
beneficed, be imprisoned one year for the first offence, and for life for the
second; and if he be beneficed, he shall for the first offence be imprisoned
six months, and forfeit a year’s value of his benefice; for the second offence
he shall be deprived, and suffer one year’s imprisonment; and for the third
shall in like manner be deprived, and suffer imprisonment for life. And if any
person whatsoever shall, in plays, songs, or other open words, speak any
thing in derogation, depraving, or despising of said book, or shall forcibly
prevent the reading of it, or cause any other service to be used in its stead,
he shall forfeit for the first offence a hundred marks; for the second, four
hundred; and for the third shall forfeit all his goods and chattels, and suffer
imprisonment for life. These penalties were framed in the infancy of our
present establishment, when the disciples of Rome and of Geneva united in
inveighing with the utmost bitterness against the English liturgy; and the
terror of these laws (for they seldom, if ever, were fully executed) proved a
principal means, under Providence, of preserving the purity as well as decency
of our national worship.

Edward VI (above) and Elizabeth I decreed "that whoever
reviles the sacrament of the Lord's Supper shall be punished
by fine and imprisonment."

Nor can their continuance to this time (of the milder
penalties at least) be thought too severe and intolerant; so far as they are levelled
at the offence, not of thinking differently from the national church,
but of railing at that church and obstructing its
ordinances for not submitting its public judgment to the private opinion of
others. For, though it is clear that no restraint should be laid upon rational
and dispassionate discussions of the rectitude and propriety of the established
mode of worship, yet contumely and contempt are what no establishment can
tolerate. A rigid attachment to trifles, and an intemperate zeal for
reforming them, are equally ridiculous and absurd; but the latter is at present
the less excusable, because from political reasons, sufficiently hinted at in a
former volume, it would now be extremely unadvisable to make any
alterations in the service of the church; unless by its own consent, or unless
it can be shown that some manifest impiety or shocking absurdity will follow
from continuing the present forms.

On punishing non-conformists:2. Non-conformity to the worship of
the church is the other or negative branch of this offence. And for this there
is much more to be pleaded than for the former; being a matter of private
conscience, to the scruples of which our present laws have shown a very just
and Christian indulgence. For undoubtedly all persecution and oppression of
weak consciences, on the score of religious persuasions, are highly
unjustifiable upon every principle of natural reason, civil liberty, or sound
religion. But care must be taken not to carry this indulgence into such
extremes as may endanger the national church: there is always a difference to
be made between toleration and establishment.Non-conformists are of two sorts:
first, such as absent themselves from divine worship in the established church,
through total irreligion, and attend the service of no other persuasion. These,
by the statutes of 1 Eliz. c. 2, 23 Eliz. c. 1, and 3 Jac. I.
c. 4, forfeit one shilling to the poor every Lord’s day they so absent
themselves, and 20l. to the king if they continue such default for a month
together. And if they keep any inmate, thus irreligiously disposed, in their
houses, they forfeit 10l. per month.The second species of
non-conformists are those who offend through a mistaken or perverse zeal. Such
were esteemed by our laws, enacted since the time of the reformation, to be
papists and Protestant dissenters; both of which were supposed to be equally
schismatics in not communicating with the national church; with this
difference, that the papists divided from it upon material, though erroneous,
reasons; but many of the dissenters upon matters of indifference, or, in other
words, upon no reason at all. Yet certainly our ancestors were mistaken in
their plans of compulsion and intolerance. The sin of schism, as such, is by no
means the object of temporal coercion and punishment. If, through weakness of
intellect, through misdirected piety, through perverseness and acerbity of
temper, or (which is often the case) through a prospect of secular advantage in
herding with a party, men quarrel with the ecclesiastical establishment, the
civil magistrate has nothing to do with it, unless their tenets and practice
are such as threaten ruin or disturbance to the state. He is bound indeed to
protect the established church; and, if this can be better effected by
admitting none but its genuine members to offices of trust and emolument, he is
certainly at liberty so to do: the disposal of offices being matter of favour
and discretion. But, this point being once secured, all persecution for
diversity of opinions, however ridiculous or absurd they may be, is contrary to
every principle of sound policy and civil freedom. The names and subordination
of the clergy, the posture of devotion, the materials and colour of the
minister’s garment, the joining in a known or unknown form of prayer, and other
matters of the same kind, must be left to the option of every man’s private
judgment.

On laws against Papists:The restless machinations of the Jesuits during the reign of
Elizabeth, the turbulence and uneasiness of the papists under the new religious
establishment, and the boldness of their hopes and wishes for the succession of
the queen of Scots, obliged the parliament to counteract so dangerous a spirit
by laws of a great, and then perhaps necessary, severity. The powder-treason in
the succeeding reign struck a panic into James I., which operated in different
ways: it occasioned the enacting of new laws against the papists, but deterred
him from putting them in execution. The intrigues of queen Henrietta in the
reign of Charles I., the prospect of a popish successor in that of Charles II.,
the assassination-plot in the reign of king William, and the avowed claim of a
popish pretender to the crown in that and subsequent reigns, will account for
the extension of these penalties at those several periods of our history.A footnote reads:

The Roman Catholics cannot sit in either house of
parliament, because every member of parliament must take the oath of supremacy,
and repeat and subscribe the declaration against transubstantiation, (see 1
book, 162;) nor can they vote at elections for the members of the house of
commons, because before they vote they must take the oath of supremacy.

The Roman Catholics in Ireland
are permitted to vote at elections, but they cannot sit in either house of
parliament.

A bequest or disposition for the purpose of educating
children in the Roman Catholic religion is unlawful. But the fund will not pass
to the testator’s next of kin, but it shall be applied to such charitable
purposes as his majesty shall please to direct by his signmanual.

On acts to protect the established church:In order the better to secure the established church against
perils from non-conformists of all denominations, infidels, Turks, Jews,
heretics, papists, and sectaries, there are, however, two bulwarks erected;
called the corporation and test acts: by the former of which no
person can be legally elected to any office relating to the government of any
city or corporation, unless within a twelvemonth before he has received the
sacrament of the Lord’s supper according to the rites of the church of England;
and he is also enjoined to take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy at the same
time that he takes the oath of office; or, in default of either of these
requisites, such election shall be void. The other, called the test act, directs
all officers, civil and military, to take the oaths and make the declaration
against transubstantiation in any of the king’s courts at Westminster, or at
the quarter sessions, within six calendar months after their admission; and
also within the same time to receive the sacrament of the Lord’s supper
according to the usage of the church of England, in some public church,
immediately after divine service and sermon, and to deliver into court a
certificate thereof signed by the minister and church-warden, and also to prove
the same by two credible witnesses; upon forfeiture of 500l. and
disability to hold the said office. And of much the same nature with these is
the statute 7 Jac. I. c. 2, which permits no person to
be naturalized or restored in blood but such as undergo a like test: which test
having been removed in 1753, in favour of the Jews, was the next session of parliament
restored again with some precipitation.

"The restless machinations of the Jesuits during the reign
of Elizabeth [above], the turbulence and uneasiness of the
papists under the new religious establishment, and the
boldness of their hopes and wishes for the succession
of the queen of Scots, obliged the parliament to
counteract so dangerous a spirit by laws
of a great, and then perhaps necessary,
severity."

On punishing blasphemy:

Thus much for offences which strike
at our national religion, or the doctrine and discipline of the church of
England in particular. I proceed now to consider some gross impieties and
general immoralities which are taken notice of and punished by our municipal
law; frequently in concurrence with the ecclesiastical, to which the censure of
many of them does also of right appertain; though with a view somewhat
different: the spiritual court punishing all sinful enormities for the sake of
reforming the private sinner, pro salute animæ; while the temporal
courts resent the public affront to religion and morality on which all
governments must depend for support, and correct more for the sake of example
than private amendment.IV. The fourth species of offences,
therefore, more immediately against God and religion, is that of blasphemy against
the Almighty by denying his being or providence; or by contumelious reproaches
of our Saviour Christ. Whither also may be referred all profane scoffing at the
holy scripture, or exposing it to contempt and ridicule. These are offences
punishable at common law by fine and imprisonment, or other infamous corporal
punishment; for Christianity is part of the laws of England.A footnote reads:

It is not lawful even to publish a correct account of
the proceedings in a court of justice if it contain matter of a scandalous,
blasphemous, or indecent nature, (3 B. & A. 167;) and a publication stating
our Saviour to be an impostor, and a murderer in principle, and a fanatic, is a
libel at common law. 1 B. & C. 26. The general law as to this offence, as
collected from 2 Stra. 834, Fitzg. 64, Barn. R. 162, is that it is illegal to
write against Christianity in general; that it is also illegal to write against
any one of its evidences or doctrines, so as to manifest a malicious design to
undermine it altogether; but that it is not illegal to write, with decency, on
controverted points, whereby it is possible some articles of belief may be
affected.—Chitty.

On punishing profane swearing and cursing:V. Somewhat allied to this, though
in an inferior degree, is the offence of profane and common swearing and cursing. By the last statute against which, 19 Geo. II. c. 21, which
repeals all former ones, every labourer, sailor, or soldier profanely cursing
or swearing shall forfeit 1s.; every other person, under the degree of a
gentleman, 2s.; and every gentleman, or person of superior rank, 5s., to
the poor of the parish; and, on the second conviction, double; and for every
subsequent offence, treble the sum first forfeited; with all charges of
conviction: and in default of payment shall be sent to the house of correction for
ten days. Any justice of the peace may convict upon his own hearing, or the
testimony of one witness; and any constable or peace officer, upon his own
hearing, may secure any offender and carry him before a justice and there
convict him. If the justice omits his duty he forfeits 5l., and the
constable 40s. And the act is to be read in all parish churches and public
chapels the Sunday after every quarter-day, on pain of 5l., to be levied
by warrant from any justice. Besides this punishment for taking God’s name
in vain in common discourse, it is enacted, by statute 3 Jac. I. c. 21, that
if, in any stage-play, interlude, or show, the name of the Holy Trinity, or any
of the persons therein, be jestingly or profanely used, the offender shall
forfeit 10l., one moiety to the king, and the other to the informer.

On punishing witchcraft:

VI. A sixth species of offence
against God and religion, of which our antient books are full, is a crime of
which one knows not well what account to give. I mean the offence of witchcraft,
conjuration, enchantment, or sorcery. To deny the possibility,
nay, actual existence, of witchcraft and sorcery is at once flatly to
contradict the revealed word of God, in various passages both of the Old and
New Testament: and the thing itself is a truth to which every nation in the
world hath in its turn borne testimony, either by examples seemingly well
attested or by prohibitory laws; which at least suppose the possibility of
commerce with evil spirits. The civil law punishes with death not only the
sorcerers themselves, but also those who consult them, imitating in the
former the express law of God, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.”And our own laws, both before and since the conquest, have been equally
penal; ranking this crime in the same class with heresy, and condemning both to
the flames. The president Montesquieu ranks them also both together,
but with a very different view: laying it down as an important maxim that we
ought to be very circumspect in the prosecution of magic and heresy; because
the most unexceptionable conduct, the purest morals, and the constant practice
of every duty in life are not a sufficient security against the suspicion of
crimes like these. And indeed the ridiculous stories that are generally told,
and the many impostures and delusions that have been discovered in all ages,
are enough to demolish all faith in such a dubious crime; if the contrary
evidence were not also extremely strong. Wherefore it seems to be the most
eligible way to conclude, with an ingenious writer of our own, that in
general there has been such a thing as witchcraft; though one cannot give credit
to any particular modern instance of it.Our forefathers were stronger
believers when they enacted, by statute 33 Hen. VIII. c. 8, all witchcraft and
sorcery to be felony without benefit of clergy; and again, by statute 1 Jac. I.
c. 12, that all persons invoking any evil spirit, or consulting, covenanting
with, entertaining, employing, feeding, or rewarding, any evil spirit; or
taking up dead bodies from their graves to be used in any witchcraft, sorcery,
charm, or enchantment; or killing or otherwise hurting any person by such
infernal arts, should be guilty of felony without benefit of clergy, and suffer
death.And if any person should attempt by sorcery to discover hidden treasure,
or to restore stolen goods, or to provoke unlawful love, or to hurt any man or
beast, though the same were not effected, he or she should suffer imprisonment
and pillory for the first offence, and death for the second. These acts
continued in force till lately, to the terror of all antient females in the
kingdom: and many poor wretches were sacrificed thereby to the prejudice of
their neighbours and their own illusions; not a few having, by some means or
other, confessed the fact at the gallows. But all executions for this dubious
crime are now at an end; our legislature having at length followed the wise
example of Louis XIV. in France,
who thought proper, by an edict, to restrain the tribunals of justice from
receiving informations of witchcraft. And accordingly it is with us
enacted, by statute 9 Geo. II. c. 5, that no prosecution shall for the future
be carried on against any persons for conjuration, witchcraft, sorcery, or
enchantment. But the misdemeanour of persons pretending to use witchcraft, tell
fortunes, or discover stolen goods, by skill in the occult sciences, is still
deservedly punished with a year’s imprisonment, and standing four times in the
pillory.

"To deny the possibility, nay, actual existence,
of witchcraft and sorcery is at once to flatly
contradict the revealed word of God ... and the
thing itself is a truth to which every nation in
the world hath in its turn borne testimony."
-- Sir William Blackstone

On punishing religious imposters:

VII. A seventh species of offenders in this class are all religious
impostors: such as falsely pretend an extraordinary commission from
heaven, or terrify and abuse the people with false denunciations of judgments.
These, as tending to subvert all religion by bringing it into ridicule and
contempt, are punishable by the temporal courts with fine, imprisonment, and
infamous corporal punishment.

On punishing simony:

VIII. Simony, or the corrupt
presentation of any one to an ecclesiastical benefice for gift or reward, is
also to be considered as an offence against religion; as well by reason of the
sacredness of the charge which is thus profanely bought and sold, as because it
is always attended with perjury in the person presented. The statute 31 Eliz.
c. 6 (which, so far as it relates to the forfeiture of the right of
presentation, was considered in a former book) enacts that if any patron,
for money or any other corrupt consideration or promise, directly or indirectly
given, shall present, admit, institute, induct, instal, or collate, any person
to an ecclesiastical benefice or dignity, both the giver and taker shall
forfeit two years’ value of the benefice or dignity; one moiety to the king,
and the other to any one who will sue for the same. If persons also corruptly
resign or exchange their benefices, both the giver and taker shall in like
manner forfeit double the value of the money or other corrupt consideration. And
persons who shall corruptly ordain or license any minister, or procure him
to be ordained or licensed, (which is the true idea of simony,) shall incur a
like forfeiture of forty pounds; and the minister himself of ten pounds,
besides an incapacity to hold any ecclesiastical preferment for seven years
afterwards. Corrupt elections and resignations in colleges, hospitals, and
other eleemosynary corporations, are also punished by the same statute with
forfeiture of the double value, vacating the place or office, and a devolution
of the right of election for that turn to the crown.On punishing Sabbath desecration:IX. Profanation of the Lord’s day ... is a ninth offence
against God and religion, punished by the municipal law of England.
For, besides the notorious indecency and scandal of permitting any secular
business to be publicly transacted on that day in a country professing
Christianity, and the corruption of morals which usually follows its
profanation, the keeping one day in the seven holy, as a time of relaxation and
refreshment as well as for public worship, is of admirable service to a state,
considered merely as a civil institution. It humanizes, by the help of
conversation and society, the manners of the lower classes, which would
otherwise degenerate into a sordid ferocity and savage selfishness of spirit;
it enables the industrious workman to pursue his occupation in the ensuing week
with health and cheerfulness; it imprints on the minds of the people that sense
of their duty to God so necessary to make them good citizens, but which yet
would be worn out and defaced by an unremitted continuance of labour, without
any stated times of recalling them to the worship of their Maker.And,
therefore, the laws of king Athelstan forbade all merchandizing on the
Lord’s day, under very severe penalties. And by the statute 27 Hen. VI. c. 5,
no fair or market shall be held on the principal festivals, Good Friday, or any
Sunday, (except the four Sundays in harvest,) on pain of forfeiting the goods
exposed to sale. And since, by the statute 1 Car. I. c.
1, no persons shall assemble out of their own parishes for any sport whatsoever
upon this day; nor, in their parishes, shall use any bull or bear baiting,
interludes, plays, or other unlawful exercises or pastimes; on pain
that every offender shall pay 3s. 4d. to the poor. This statute does
not prohibit, but rather impliedly allows, any innocent recreation or
amusement, within their respective parishes, even on the Lord’s day, after
divine service is over. But, by statute 29 Car. II. c. 7, no person is allowed
to work on the Lord’s day, or use any boat or barge, or expose any
goods to sale; except meat in public houses, milk at certain hours, and works
of necessity or charity, on forfeiture of 5s. Nor shall any drover,
carrier, or the like travel upon that day, under pain of twenty shillings.On punishing drunkenness:X. Drunkenness is also punished, by
statute 4 Jac. I. c. 5, with the forfeiture of 5s., or
the sitting six hours in the stocks: by which time the statute presumes the
offender will have regained his senses, and not be liable to do mischief to his
neighbours. And there are many wholesome statutes by way of prevention, chiefly
passed in the same reign of king James I., which regulate the licensing of
alehouses, and punish persons found tippling therein; or the master of such
houses permitting them.

On punishing open lewdness:

XI. The last offence which I shall
mention, more immediately against religion and morality, and cognizable by the
temporal courts, is that of open and notorious lewdness; either by
frequenting houses of ill fame, which is an indictable offence; or by some
grossly scandalous and public indecency, for which the punishment is by fine
and imprisonment. In the year 1650, when the ruling power found it for
their interest to put on the semblance of a very extraordinary strictness and
purity of morals, not only incest and wilful adultery were made capital crimes,
but also the repeated act of keeping a brothel, or committing fornication, were
(upon a second conviction) made felony without benefit of clergy. But at
the restoration, when men, from an abhorrence of the hypocrisy of the late
times, fell into the contrary extreme of licentiousness, it was not thought
proper to renew a law of such unfashionable rigour. And these offences
have been ever since left to the feeble coercion of the spiritual court
according to the rules of the canon law; a law which has treated the offence of
incontinence, nay, even adultery itself, with a great degree of tenderness and
lenity, owing perhaps to the constrained celibacy of its first compilers. The
temporal courts therefore take no cognizance of the crime of adultery otherwise
than as a private injury.

Note about the Theonomy Applied Series: In quoting any particular law, we do not necessarily endorse every aspect of that law as biblical, whether it be the prohibition, sanction, court procedure, etc. Rather, we are merely showing the more or less attempt to apply biblical law in history, whether or not that application was fully biblical. Moreover, in quoting any particular law, we do not necessarily consider those who passed and/or enforced such a law as being fully orthodox in their Christian theology. Professing Christian rulers in history have ranged in their theology from being orthodox (that is, Reformed Protestants) to heretical (for example, Roman Catholics).